US pharmacy students on an exchange programme gave a local practice forum meeting in West Yorkshire an insight into the DPharm programme. Gill Hawksworth reports
The local practice forum (LPF) network needs to make sure pharmacy undergraduate are welcomed into the profession at an early stage and are encouraged to engage with the work of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society locally.
Following several successful LPF events where large numbers of students have attended, I was pleased to welcome four US pharmacy students from Wilkes University in Pennsylvania to a meeting at the University of Huddersfield on 14 November 2011. About 50 students attended to hear about the US pharmacy undergraduate course. The international exchange had been organised by senior lecturer Mahendra Patel, finance lead of the West Yorkshire LPF.
The US undergraduate course to DPharm is six years, with two years of undergraduate classes and four years of professional pharmacy classes. The pharmacy college admission test consists of chemistry, organic chemistry, biology, English and English literature. The students described the professional school prerequisites which, surprisingly, include art, music and dance, philosophy and foreign languages, psychology, sociology, political science, economics and world history.
They also described introductory pharmacy practice experiences similar to the British system (eg, in community and in hospital) and advanced pharmacy practice experiences. The advanced experiences are in the final year of the DPharm programme and are in seven rotations, with each one lasting five weeks.
Four rotations are in required settings, consisting of internal medicine, ambulatory medicine, institutional medicine and community medicine. Three rotations are electives from England, Peru, an African country, native American health services, managed care (formulary management, medication therapy management and contract negotiation with manufacturers), corporate pharmacy management and specialty.
A range of residences similar to specialist areas of practice in the UK were discussed. It was revealed that students need to do 700 hours of pharmacy experience alongside their studies.
There was a big debate about the fast growing emergence of mail order pharmacy in the US, where large warehouses are used as distribution points. This was not popular with the British students present, who thought it was moving in the opposite direction to Britain, where community pharmacists were developing and using more clinical skills through provision of services, such as the new medicine service and targeted medicines use reviews in England.
A further big discussion point was that University of Huddersfield students who had been on the exchange thought that the US course was much more pressured because they have to study constantly for frequent examinations, unlike the end-of-year examinations in the UK. It was not only the constant pressure of examinations that interested the meeting, but also how US pharmacy students learnt about specific disease states. For example, they are taught by two different professors who focus on different aspects, such as the chemistry and pharmacology and then the practice side of how drugs are used.
The cost of studying was a point of great interest, and it was revealed that the US fees are $30,000 each year on average, with funding from private or government loans (although school scholarships are available). The average debt after graduation is greater than $120,000.
The US students were pleased to have a full programme of events while visiting Huddersfield and learning about pharmacy in the UK. The West Yorkshire LPF also arranged a visit to meet the RPS President at the headquarters in Lambeth, London. A highlight of their visit was on their first day at the university, when they got to meet and have their photo taken with chancellor Patrick Stewart who is, of course, an internationally recognised actor.
Gill Hawksworth is lead for the West Yorkshire Local Practice Forum
